The Nature of Betrayal
by Badfluffy
Summary: Kalinda asks Cary for his help and by doing so discloses the extent of her involvement in Peter's scandal.


Disclaimer: None of these characters belong to me. They belong to their Mommy and Daddy, Michelle and Robert King and also to their Fairy Godmother, CBS.

Note: This story was most almost entirely written during the break between episode 12 and 13. It's still rough around the edges but I wanted to publish it such as it is, a theory on what is going to happen and what has already happened with the involvement of Kalinda in Peter's scandal. I know nothing of what is going to happen in "Hi"except for what I saw in the promo. I added the epilogue as a wink to one of the lines included in the promo and I found it worked much better as an ending than the one I had so far. With this being said, please consider it a poke at what might be going on. My theory might look pretty stupid by tonight, which is why I wanted to publish the story before the show kicked my chair from under me.

I'm always looking to improve myself so please don't hesitate to review and comment. And who knows, if I'm not too far from what actually happens, I might keep it alive for a few more chapters, depending on what goes on. Enjoy :)

The Nature of Betrayal

"Hi"

Alicia looked up from her computer screen and watched Kalinda take a seat next to her desk.

"Good morning... you just got in?"

For a fraction of a second; Kalinda seemed taken aback by the question. A quick widening of the eyes, a blink then it was gone. She recomposed herself so quickly, nobody else would have even noticed the slight hesitation. But Alicia had come to know a lot about Kalinda by working with her in the past months. Well... if she hadn't learned a lot about her per se, she at least had learned about her personality and it was rare to see her lose her composure even for an instant. In fact she had looked flustered. Whatever was troubling her was certainly significant... and personal, all the more reason to stay clear of it. Alicia didn't know a lot about Kalinda's personal life but she knew for sure she was an intensely private person and her personal life was not to be discussed. She let it slide. Kalinda now wore one of her patented detached looks.

"Did you get that continuance on the Alberts case?"

How predictable that she would change the subject by steering the conversation back to work.

"Yes. We have 14 days to get new evidence. After that, I'm really not sure what I'll do"

Kalinda wore a ghost of a smile when she replied. "You'll figure something out, you always do."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence but I'm not so sure about it myself. Besides, I'm having trouble focusing on work these days... with the trial."

_The_ trial. Of course, working in a law firm and handling three cases at the same time, there was always at least ONE trial going on. But Alicia knew she didn't have to say which trial she was talking about. Her husband's appeal. The hearing was still ongoing, the outcome and eventual retrial still uncertain. As if she had read her mind, Kalinda, frowning slightly, asked, as if trying not to put too much concern in her words "How is it going?"

Even if Alicia had forced herself to attend as much as possible, sometimes merely eavesdropping behind a closed door so that she wouldn't have to stand the stares and the pity looks, she had a hard time figuring out if it was going well or not. And she was a lawyer. All those years in school and the hours spent in a court room didn't help her at all. She was just too close to the issue. She supposed that was the reason surgeons didn't operate on their family.

"Honestly, I couldn't tell you. I try to understand where Peter's lawyer is going with his cross examinations but I have trouble figuring it out. Maybe it'll be clearer when he presents his case. I hear the prosecution has a few more witnesses and then it will be the defense's turn."

There it was again, _the_ frown. Maybe she had just asked to be polite and didn't really want to go into the details of Alicia's feelings about the trial. Maybe she was bored by the whole thing. Maybe she thought Peter ought to stay in jail. It was hard to tell with Kalinda; It was not like her to do idle chat though. If she hadn't want to hear about it, she wouldn't have asked, not out of politeness, anyway. Kalinda didn't do polite.

"Sorry... I'm boring you with this again."

"Hey. I asked for it, remember?"

It's not as if they discussed it often. Kalinda being so secretive about herself, she never pressed for details about others' lives. It's not as if she _had_ to discuss it either. Alicia had become such an expert at keeping things bottled up, she scared herself sometimes. But for some reason, maybe because of that conversation over a shot of tequila, months ago, when they had barely known each other and they were waiting for a verdict, maybe because Kalinda had been open and honest about her own opinion and non-judgmental, Alicia felt she had found the _one_ person she could talk to about Peter and the trial and the scandal and the humiliation.

Who else could she talk to? Her children and Jackie were out of the question. Her mother thought she was a damn fool for allowing herself to be used by Peter like that, not that they ever were that close anyway. Her brother was somewhere in Africa with an NGO, not exactly reachable. All her so-called friends had deserted her.

She didn't fool herself that Kalinda considered her a friend. But there was friendship there. Or at the very least enough concern and respect that she could let lose a comment every once in a while about the state of things. Driving to or from court, at the office over a late night drink, on a break from a work conference. A few words in otherwise strictly business exchanges. Kalinda never seemed to mind. Sometimes she asked a few questions, spurring the conversation forward, sometimes she just listened quietly until Alicia had vented enough that she was not going to explode from the pressure. Maybe it was because she didn't have a stake in it. There was nothing about the case or its impact on Alicia that held any consequence for Kalinda. Maybe that's why Alicia found it was easy to talk to her about it. She didn't feel she had to hide or embellish anything. She never seemed to mind... until today.

Something was off but Alicia could not figure out what and a direct query was out of the question. Maybe she was too preoccupied with whatever was troubling her this morning, whatever was going on in her own life to listen to Alicia ranting about her problems.

Just as she was casting about for a lighter topic of conversation, Cary stopped by her office and lightly knocked on the open door.

"Ladies. Am I interrupting?" Not waiting for an answer, he continued "Kalinda, Courtney told me you were looking for me?"

Kalinda nodded. "Alicia... I'll see you later". She sauntered off behind Cary quite uncharacteristically.

Alicia thought something was definitely up. Kalinda was never eager to talk to Cary and they were not working on any case together... whatever was going on, she hoped it wasn't too serious.

.

* * *

.

Cary had barely crossed the hallway that separated Alicia's office from his when he spoke "So what do you need?"

He stepped behind his desk and started shuffling papers around when he heard the sound of the door closing. He raised his head just in time to see Kalinda settling into a chair across from him.

"Look, it's not that I would mind a desk bang over lunch but you probably noticed my office has more windows than walls so maybe we could wait until tonight when everyone's gone?"

He was leering at Kalinda and her glare only broadened his boyish grin.

Kalinda ignored his comment. "I need legal advice and possibly representation."

Cary sobered up. She was obviously asking for help and the last time she had, he had made one small offhanded comment about not being able to do something by herself and she had made him pay for days. Besides, if she needed his help as a lawyer, it was most likely on a personal matter and he was dying to know more about her so this could be the best opportunity he'd ever had to gather some more pieces of the puzzle called Kalinda.

"Legal advice on..."

Kalinda opened her mouth to reply but suddenly Cary wondered aloud. "Why didn't you go to Alicia?". He knew Kalinda avoided him whenever she could, which she didn't do with Alicia, and if they _had_ had a fight, he wanted to get the dirt first.

Kalinda looked straight at him and with determination said "I can't. It concerns Peter Florrick's appeal..."

Cary was mildly disappointed the matter wasn't personal but his curiosity was piqued as to how Kalinda would be involved in Alicia's husband hearing.

"You need legal advice concerning Florrick?"

"You know I worked with him at the State's Attorney's Office, don't you?"

Cary sat down. No, he didn't. He didn't even know how long she'd been working at SLG. She had refused to answer the last time he had asked and he never had the occasion to ask again.

"I didn't... do I take it you have information you might want to volunteer and need advice on how to proceed? This hardly means you need representation."

Kalinda took papers from inside her jacket, and slapped the subpoena she'd been served in the morning on the desk.

"No I need advice concerning the Fifth Amendment."

"You've been served?"

"This morning."

He read the subpoena. "The prosecution wants you to testify... any idea why?"

She nodded. "Yes... so... Talk to me about taking the Fifth on the stand"

That was so typical. She just wanted to pump him for information with no intention of giving any. Cary held up his hands. "Whoa whoa... let's start at the beginning, shall we? What is this all about? Why would you take the Fifth?"

Kalinda sighed. "I need to know it's going to stay between us. No-one, not Will, not Diane and _not_ Alicia, not your drinking buddies you want to impress with insider knowledge, and _not_ your little reporter girlfriend... "

He interrupted. "We broke up."

Kalinda stared at him. "How sad. Cary I'm not kidding. _No-one_ must hear a word about this, got it?"

Cary looked at her intensely. "Of course. Look, I know you don't trust me but if I'm your lawyer, then I'm your lawyer. The standard rules apply. Attorney-client privilege. Nothing will get out of here."

Kalinda nodded. They had a deal. He knew that she still wouldn't trust him when this was over but at least she trusted him as a lawyer, that was something.

"So... "

Kalinda relaxed in the chair a little. "I worked at the SA's office as an investigator for a little under 3 years. For the first two years, I was just another grunt, usual investigation stuff. The cops brought us cases, we did background to prepare trials... not very different from what I do here, except on the other side of the alley."

The phone rang. Cary held up a finger and picked up. "Yes? ok thanks... Courtney, I'd like about an hour without interruption so unless it's important, take a message, alright?" He looked to Kalinda. "Sorry... so you were a grunt working run-of-the-mill cases..."

"Right. I guess I did my job better than most or maybe I made a few high profile cases that got me some attention, I dunno. I'd just started my third year when Florrick asked me to work on an SATF as an investigator."

"SATF?"

"State Attorney's Special Task Forces"

"What's a special task force?"

Kalinda gave him an exasperated look. "You're a lawyer and you're asking me what a task force is?"

Cary was indignant. "I _know_ what it is, what I want to hear is how they are created, how you get on one of those, how they work... ok?"

Kalinda gave him a resigned sigh. "Usually a dedicated unit inside the SA's office, working directly under the SA, with law enforcement units, using a team approach designed to target multi-offender, sometimes multi-jurisdictional criminal organizations to dismantle these organizations through effective prosecution. Most often, the task forces are focused on specific criminal activities.. there are SATF on Sex crimes, Child Pornography, High Tech crimes..."

"I get the picture. So this was a promotion?"

"Yeah it was. SATF are usually very much hands-on. You get more resources, the scale is bigger so the risks are higher but I didn't mind. Because I had demonstrated several times I had a productive relationship with cops, I was assigned to the Drugs Task Force. It was mostly working with DUC... sorry... Deep Undercover Cops, producing complex charging documents, followed by intensive pre-trial activity. It wasn't the biggest Task Force but I liked it. The handling prosecutor was Glenn Childs."

She paused. Cary leaned over the desk. "The current SA? _That_ Glenn Childs?"

Kalinda nodded. "Yep. Wasn't too happy about it either."

"Why? That sounds like a cool gig for a prosecutor."

Kalinda shrugged. "Too much Federal interference, too much meddling from Florrick. But mostly Childs thought it was beneath him. And it was, in a way. He's a gifted prosecutor and most of the time he was too busy wrangling FDA Agents and DOJ's Task Forces to prosecute the actual cases. Florrick got all the good press and every screwup was his. He was bitter and he resented Florrick for begrudging him the juiciest SATF that Florrick kept for himself."

Cary chuckled. "Not a love story, then, uh? I could have worked that out myself. So how does that connect you to Florrick's trial?"

Just as Kalinda opened her mouth to reply, Alicia knocked on the glass door and let herself in. "Sorry. I didn't want to interrupt but I was wondering..."

Alicia took in Kalinda's tense posture. Even Cary seemed nervous. She hesitated.

"What?"

Alicia snapped back out of her thoughts. "... I was wondering if we were still on for lunch, Kalinda. We were supposed to talk about Alberts, remember?"

For the second time today, Kalinda seemed rattled, Cary and she were acting as if she had walked in on them having sex in the conference room.

Kalinda opened her mouth to speak, visibly at a loss for words when Cary interrupted her. "I'm sorry Alicia. I need Kalinda over lunch. We are going over a new case and it's urgent."

"Sure... No problem. Kalinda... I'll see you later, we can maybe have a drink tonight and talk about the case?

Somehow Kalinda seemed to dread the usually welcomed break but she forced a smile. "Sounds good."

"Okay... I'll leave you to it, then." As she was sitting at her desk again, she glanced up as Kalinda leaned over the desk to talk to Cary as if she was afraid her voice might carry to Alicia. There was a conspiratorial tension in the air and Alicia wondered again what the hell was going on.

Kalinda talked in a hiss. "I think she knows something's up"

She was just whispering but considering her usual cool demeanor, she almost looked frantic... as if the office was bugged. Cary retorted "Maybe if you weren't acting so strange".

Kalinda glowered at him. "We can't talk here. We need privacy."

"Let's go get some lunch."

Kalinda stared at him incredulous. "Cary... you want to take a minute to look up the word 'privacy'? we can't talk in a bar!"

"Okay then, let's grab something to eat and go to my place."

Kalinda raised an eyebrow. "Your place?"

Cary smirked. "What? A bar is out of the question. We can't stay here and I know you're not going to want me anywhere near _your_ place... any other suggestion?"

Kalinda rose from her chair with resignation. "Let's go".

.

* * *

.

They rode in silence to Cary's building. As they waited for the elevator, Cary was beginning to feel the tension settle in his bones. A joke was in order. He knew she wouldn't laugh at anything he could say right now but he also knew by now she couldn't resist cracking a joke at him. The only thing he had to do was give her an overture. The elevator doors closed on them and Cary turned to Kalinda. "I hope you'll forgive the decor and the possible discarded underwear. I wasn't planning on entertaining today". He was satisfied to see Kalinda give him half a smile. "I thought the guys from Beta Beta Kappa Alpha Zeta were ALWAYS ready to entertain." He was happy to see he had succeeded in lightening the mood even if it was at his expense.

Once inside the apartment, he smiled to himself watching Kalinda taking in the surroundings. 'Investigator' was not merely a job description for her, it was the only way she had found of putting her suspicious nature and uncanny instincts to good use. She was in full investigation mode as she seemed to inspect every bit of furniture, every frame on the wall for clues to Cary's life and she shook her head slightly as she settled into the leather couch as if she had found in her cursory examination one more reason to pity him.

He has always favored flippancy over confrontation. "You like? I thought you'd enjoy the couch... you like leather, don't you?"

Kalinda herself favored indifference over confrontation so she ignored his comment, crossed her legs and brought to conversation back to business.

"You want to hear the rest of it or you want to stand here and crack wise while staring at my legs?"

"Can't we do both?"

She gave him one of those half raised eyebrow look that told him joke time was officially over.

"Right... so Childs and Florrick hated each other and you..."

"In early December 2008 Florrick asked me to work with him directly on a new Task Force he was creating to investigate shady real estate deals. He believed that the worsening real estate market and the recently disclosed enhanced venue plan for the Olympics bid had created an opportunity for some yet unnamed real estate moguls to make tons of cash by acquiring land near certain areas, specifically Washington Park and Douglas Park through fraudulent means and turn in huge profit after the announcement".

"Wait... That's the start of his corruption scandal, right?"

Kalinda sighed deeply and ran her hand over her face as if she was suddenly very tired "Yes."

"I didn't know you were involved in all this..."

She looked sharply at him. "The existence, nature and extent of my involvement are known only by two people so far... Florrick and Childs... three if you count Florrick's lawyer who probably knows as much as his client right now. You'll be the fourth."

He nodded to reassure her again he had understood how serious this was. "What exactly was the nature of your involvement?"

She raised a finger as if talking to a child. "We're getting ahead of ourselves. Let me explain a few things first."

He sat on the couch. "Sure."

"The SA usually name a handling prosecutor to head task forces. He keeps an eye on things but you don't report to him directly."

Cary interrupted. "And he named..."

"Matan Brody was technically in charge and he _was_ in a way. But Florrick told me I'd report directly to him and he would make the recommendation for prosecution to Brody."

"And that's unusual?"

Kalinda gave a low chuckle. "Very."

"That didn't make you suspicious?"

She shook her head. "Not really. I was happy at the Drugs Task Force but this was a bigger opportunity and I was flattered it was offered to me. Florrick had always struck me more as an attorney using politics to get to the top seat than as a politician using the attorney's office to get on his way to bigger better things so I thought he knew this could be big and he wanted to be the top dog on the case."

"And Childs?"

Kalinda chuckled again. "He was so pissed off, he nearly broke the door to his office slamming it when he heard Brody was HP. You know in retrospect, after the shit hit the fan, I thought even the way the task force was created was weird "

Cary frowned. "How so?"

"Well... There is a SATF dedicated to fraud already so if there was a specific branch to handle a specific case, it's logical they would have been put in charge of buildingthe team. But as I thought about it, I realized Florrick never told me, or Brody as it turned out, where the case was coming from."

"And that's also unusual."

Kalinda leaned forward. "Usually a SATF like that one is assembled to handle a case or a series of cases that either comes to the SA from the cops or from another Task Force already in place. That didn't seem to be what happened here."

Cary's couldn't contain his curiosity anymore. "So how does all this lead us to Florrick's scandal?"

Kalinda settles back deep into the couch. She lowered her eyes to the floor and stared at the carpet for a while before she raised her head and looked him in the eye. "I'm the reason it all started."

.

* * *

.

Cary was watching Kalinda while he was trying to frame his thoughts and decide what to say next. She had leaned back, her eyes closed, a frown on her face.

Finally he went for the most obvious. "What do you mean _'you_ are the reason it all started'?"

She didn't open her eyes, didn't even give a sign she had heard him. "Do you have anything to drink?"

Cary realized his whole body was tense like a rubber band ready to snap. He exhaled. "I must have some milk in the fridge..."

Kalinda, still leaning back on the couch gave him a look out of the corner of her eye. "I was thinking more of bourbon."

"Oh... uh... let me think... I know I don't have bourbon but I have beer and I think I have vodka in the freezer."

Kalinda gave a low chuckle and looked up at the ceiling. "It figures... vodka is fine... straight, leave out the cranberry"

Cary mumbled while he was getting up and heading to the kitchen. "Well... you haven't given up on the sarcasm so I guess you're ok"

He returned with a beer, the vodka and a glass. "Tell me when?"

As he was pouring, Kalinda finally opened her eyes again. She looked exhausted. "Thanks. Leave the bottle."

She took a sip of the clear liquid and stared into space.

Cary sat down on the coffee table close to her. "Kalinda... if you want me to help, I need to know everything."

Kalinda blinked slowly. "A couple of weeks into it, we had solid leads on three real estate developers. One of them was a man named Gerald Kozko. Apparently Mr. Kozko had acquired some land near the parks at an outrageous low price and sold it at a huge markup."

Cary frowned. "... which really isn't illegal. I mean the Olympics plan increased the value of those lands, right?"

"Realistically, no. It increased the speculation on the land but not their value. I found some discrepancies in the bank estimates for the property values, before the acquisition, for a credit or a mortgage, and before the resale. I also found information that led me to believe people were pressured into selling their properties for a song."

Cary interrupted. "Pressured how?"

"Threats. A lot of these people belonged to minorities and lived in neighborhoods struggling with crime and poverty. It didn't take a lot of arm twisting to get them to sell."

"And you had tangible proof of all this?"

Kalinda shook her head. "If you mean jury-proof evidence, no. But I had enough to make a case to Florrick and so I did. I reported to him about the deals I had found out about. I had interviews with the people who had to sell their houses, I had property value estimates by banks, and I had pictures."

"Pictures of what?"

Kalinda took a sip. "Of one of Kozko's employee, a regular guy in a regular suit, the kind you open your door to without thinking. As far as I could tell, he was the one who was sent to the land owners to make the offer they couldn't refuse." She paused.

Cary pressed on. "And what did he say?"

"That it was interesting. That I should keep digging and make a daily report and that I shouldn't bother Brody with this because he was working on a case already and he didn't need the distraction."

Cary shrugged. "And that's not what he was supposed to say?"

"Oh yeah. The part about Brody was fishy but I thought he merely wanted to get the glory when the case was made."

Cary couldn't help but admire the graceful curve of her neck as she tilted her head back and emptied her glass with one swig. She reached for the bottle and poured herself another drink. "The next day, I was busy with bank statements and interviews so I came back to the office fairly late. As I was walking to Florrick's office, I saw the elevator's doors closing on this guy."

Cary shook his head, confused. "What guy?"

"Kozko's emissary."

"What did you do?"

She put the bottle back down on the table. "I didn't know what to believe. I mean... that's a weird coincidence, don't you think? Seeing this guy late at the office, most likely coming out of Florrick's office, one day after I pointed him out to Peter?"

Cary snorted. "I'd say."

"I went straight to Florrick's office and demanded to know what that was all about." Kalinda's voice rose as if she was reliving the anger she had been in, walking into Peter Florrick's office. Cary didn't envy the man. "He was very calm and said nothing was going on. He denied having met anyone corresponding to the description I gave him. He asked me to report what else I had found out that day. Business as usual."

Cary could finally tell where she was going with all this but he asked anyway. "So then what did you do?"

Kalinda sighed heavily and took a drink from her glass. "I was supposed to meet Childs for drinks later that evening. I met him at a bar downtown..."she paused, her eyes looking inward, as if she was watching the memory unfold in her mind like a movie. "I told him everything."

Cary put a hand on her arm. "But at this point, there wasn't much... I mean... suspicious behavior, sure but..."

Kalinda turned sharply to face him. "Something was off. I knew it was not my imagination." Her voice softened. "Glenn said it was probably nothing. That I was overreacting. He said I should keep working the case but I should come to him if anything else felt weird."

"And that's what you did?"

"Well... Not right away. The Task Force work didn't leave me much time for freelancing but sometimes I was lending a hand to a friend of mine on the weekends, an ex-cop who was a PI and worked basic cheating spouses cases." She chuckled. "He said I was less conspicuous than a graying old slob in the bar of a posh hotel. So a few days later, I was at the Ambassador East, running surveillance on a guy whose wife had hired my friend Harry because she thought he was seeing a call girl."

Cary's eyebrows shot up. He was about to ask something but Kalinda interrupted him. "Hang on. So I follow this guy up to a room. He knocks on the door and this little blonde opens the door. They go in. One hour later exactly, he's out again."

Cary couldn't help but crack a smile. "That was fast."

Kalinda nodded. "That's also a pretty good tell-tale sign of a professional. You tend to not hang around longer than necessary if you get charged another hour for it." She drummed her fingers against her glass. "So I stayed around to confirm. I wait for the girl to get out of the room. She goes downstairs to the lobby... and checks in again."

Cary drank from his now very tepid beer and grimaced. "Why?"

"Because if you have two clients in a row, you don't want to have to tidy up the room and change the sheets yourself? We're talking high end prostitution, here, Cary... not your 25 bucks an hour shady motel fare"

Cary choked mid-swallow. "_My_ 25 bucks fare? Hold on a minute... I never paid for that kind of things... what makes you think..."

Kalinda let out a small laugh. "Figure of speech, Cary... relax."

Cary pretended to be busy moping the spilled beer from the couch. "Oh. okay... I knew that."

"Anyway. High price call girls don't usually get more than one client a night but since Mr. Cheapo had paid only for an hour, I guessed she had taken another appointment and I wanted to verify she was a hooker so I followed her and waited." She looked at Cary. "About 20 minutes later, someone knocks on the door..."

Cary stopped her with a hand in the air. "Let me guess... Peter Florrick."

She tilted her head. "Yep."

Cary leaned toward her. "That makes him a cheat, that doesn't prove he's corrupt."

Kalinda rolled her eyes. "I know! I didn't think it had anything to do with anything. But when I called my PI friend, he mentioned his client's name. Mueller. One guess who was the bank exec whose name was on all the bogus property value estimates on the land flips..."

"You mean... the guy you were following..."

Kalinda looked at him from under her eyelashes "Arnold Mueller.... was enjoying the very expensive favors of the same hooker Florrick was seeing. Quite the coincidence, wouldn't you say?"

Cary shook his head as he was trying to process all the information he had just been given. "Hell yeah. Did you confront Florrick?"

"No. He had already played innocent, I wasn't going to get any straight answer from him. I called Childs and told him about what I'd seen. I checked with a friend at vice and found out the working name of the hooker... Amber Madison."

Cary stood up abruptly and ran his hand through his hair. "Oh man!"

Kalinda crossed her arms on her chest. "So now you see _why_ I told you I started the whole thing and why I _couldn't_ go to Alicia? I brought this to Glenn Childs. _I'm_ the reason she was put through all this bullshit."

Cary looked down to her. "Well... Peter Florrick is the one who cheated and possibly took bribes. You're not responsible for this."

"I'm sure that it'll make a big difference to her when I take the stand tomorrow to say all this."

"What did Childs do next?"

"He told me to keep working for Florrick and he asked me to keep tabs on him. He went to Brody and told him about his suspicions. And he started building his case. I brought him surveillance pictures of Florrick with hookers all linked to Kozko. I got him witness accounts of meetings between Kozko and Florrick. I made his case."

"Why didn't he ask you to testify at the first trial?"

"Don't you see? He didn't _need_ me at the first trial! The jury bought it, the sex scandal clouded everything and he didn't even really had to prove anything. Florrick admitted having sex with hookers. It was on tv 24/7! The jury got confused by the charges and they convicted without Childs really having to make his case!"

Cary shrugged. "You want me to talk to him? Maybe he can be convinced..."

Kalinda cut him off. "I talked to him this morning after I was served. He won't hear a thing. He thinks I'm his secret weapon. He believes that if I take the stand and testify to what I saw, it will put all his circumstantial evidence into perspective."

Cary sat down on the couch next to her with a sigh, carefully wording the bad news. "Kalinda, from what you told me, there is nothing that will allow you to invoke the Fifth amendment here. You can only take the Fifth if there is anything in your replies that could incriminate you in any illegal or criminal activity. And even if you had to trespass or something like that to take pictures, it would hardly be justification enough. I'm sorry."

Kalinda's head was bowed and he didn't see her face as she replied. "But what if I had taken a bribe? If I had been paid by Kozko or Florrick to look the other way, I could take the Fifth on the stand and decline to answer, right?"

Cary startled. "Did you?"

She didn't look up. "Look... we're dealing in hypothetics now, Cary. _If_ I took a bribe, then I could take the 5th, am I right or wrong?"

Cary felt a wave of anger coming over him. He stood and paced his dining room. "You still don't trust me, do you? You tell me all this and you still don't trust me with the one vital piece of information about yourself... sure... why trust the rich kid, right? I'm just here to be used, that's all you see when you look at me, right?"

Kalinda stood up and put herself in his path. "You don't understand Cary. You're a sworn officer of the court. If I took a bribe and say on the stand I didn't, I'm perjuring myself and you have to report it. If I didn't and I take the Fifth, that's perjury too and you have to report me. I'm just trying to keep you out of it."

He blinked. "You would do all this to protect _her_ from the truth?"

Kalinda looked away and said with finality. "No. I need to protect myself."

Cary moved so that he would face her. "If you were only protecting yourself, you'd just take the Fifth... _If_ you took a bribe. If you didn't, you could just tell the truth... you wouldn't need the Fifth."

She looked up at him. "There's not much I can do. Either I tell the truth, take the Fifth or refuse to answer."

He shook his head vigorously. "You can't. It's just a hearing but if you refuse to answer, the judge will hold you in contempt. You can get up to 6 months in jail."

She shrugged. "There's not a single person who's ever done 6 months in Illinois for contempt."

"Is that why you said you could need representation? You had already decided what you were going to do." He thought she didn't understand just how serious this could be.

"Can I count on you if I need a lawyer?"

He looked her straight in the eyes. "You know you can. But that won't make much of a difference. Judge Winter _will_ put you in jail, Kalinda... Do you know he wrote a paper defending Rozak's decision to sentence a man to 6 months for yawning during sentencing?"

She seemed very calm, too calm... as if she had just made her mind. "You know how much time he did? Three weeks!"

Cary couldn't believe his ears. "Kalinda... Three weeks in jail is a long time!"

She smiled. "And you know that from what? Watching 'Oz'? It's County Jail, Cary, not Maximum Security!"

"You don't believe me, ask Peter Florrick... Why are you doing this? To protect Alicia?"

Kalinda exhaled angrily. "Look... you're wasting your breath. I won't change my mind. I don't even know if it will come to that. Thanks for the advice. I have to get back to the office now."And with that she stalked off to the front door and let herself out of the apartment, leaving a speechless Cary shaking his head in disbelief in her wake.

.

Epilogue

.

Alicia and Kalinda were sitting in silence at a bar just a couple of blocks from the office. Kalinda had been back after lunch as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened; as if she hadn't disappear over lunch with Cary, of all people. Alicia had made no comment. None at all. They had started to work on the Alberts case and spent the afternoon on it. The mood had been light until Alicia reminded Kalinda they were supposed to get a drink. That had seemed to stop her dead in her tracks as if she had been brutally recalled to an unpleasant reality. She had suggested a place and they had not said one word until they had ordered their drinks. A Vodka Cranberry for Alicia (for some reason that had gotten a smile out of Kalinda) and a whiskey, neat, for her companion.

Somehow she had the feeling Kalinda was about to tell her something, or was hesitating to tell her something, she couldn't say which. Alicia had an idea of what it could be but she couldn't believe it so she resolved not to press if Kalinda remained silent.

After a while, she opened her mouth to break the silence, talk about the kids, anything to alleviate the gloom just as Kalinda was saying "Alicia... I have something to tell you." They laughed lightly as the tension evaporated for a few minutes.

Alicia smiled her encouragement. "Go on."

Kalinda seemed hesitant again so Alicia decided to go ahead and ask the question that had been burning inside her brain all afternoon. She blurted out "Are you having an affair with Cary?"

Kalinda looked stunned for half a second then burst out laughing. When she was able to breath normally again, she said, "What? No!"She sobered up and blinked a few times. "God, no. What made you think I was?"

Alicia shrugged one shoulder. "I don't know... you two acted... _strange_ this morning. You talked like co-conspirators, you disappeared for two hours. You looked troubled." She chuckled. "I don't know... my hyper-active imagination I suppose." She breathed a sigh of relief. That would have been really too weird. "So what is it you wanted to tell me?"

Kalinda inhaled deeply and looked down at her hands. "Stay away from court tomorrow."

Alicia's head turned sharply almost of her own accord to stare questioningly at Kalinda who was avoiding her eyes. Her mind raced in twenty different directions and she formulated a hundred questions in her head but the only question she could think of was "Why?"

Kalinda's eyes were riveted to the bar as if she was looking for flaws in the polished wood. "Things might be said that will upset you."

Alicia frowned. She wanted to say "How do you know that?"

She wanted to ask "What is going to happen now?"

She wanted to scream "What's going on?" but the only thing she said was "Okay."

She laid her hand next to Kalinda's on the bar, partly to attract her attention back to her, partly because she wanted to stress what she was about to say. She wanted... she _needed_ Kalinda to believe it.

Kalinda looked at her hand and then back up. Alicia's face was serene as she said "I trust you."

Kalinda looked at their reflection in the mirror above the bar and wondered how long that trust would last and if she'd find a way to deserve it still by tomorrow night.

.

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The End?


End file.
